


come and go

by antagonists



Series: Kannagara [4]
Category: Persona 5
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-17
Updated: 2017-05-17
Packaged: 2018-11-01 16:59:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10926135
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antagonists/pseuds/antagonists
Summary: They first meet around Yusuke’s second home, up north where the mountains stand tall and white, and where the rivers run slowly beneath winter glass.





	come and go

**Author's Note:**

> [雷神 小動 刺雲 雨零耶 君将留]  
> [雷神 小動 雖不零 吾将留 妹留者]
> 
> [—万葉集 11, 2514 – 2513](http://jti.lib.virginia.edu/japanese/manyoshu/AnoMany.html)

* * *

 

 

 

They first meet around Yusuke’s second home, up north where the mountains stand tall and white, and where the rivers run slowly beneath winter glass.

 

Or rather, Yusuke finds Akira: a mere boy in a forest, seeking to cage a god.

 

Every few days, Akira visits Yusuke. Always when he is alone, always when the skies are clear and blinding. His master must smell the human on him, but he does not mention it; he must assume Yusuke is planning to consume the human’s soul. Yusuke does not know where Akira stays, has never bothered to follow in fear of wandering too far.

 

“He hasn’t been feeding you well, hm?” the priest asks, not unkindly, moving close enough that Yusuke can smell rain and incense and _death_. What kind of priest smells so strongly of the underworld? Yet he’s so beautiful and quiet and _charming_ , as sweet as he is sharp. Sometimes, he finds himself wishing to be closer, nose pressed into Akira’s nape to smell dawn and daylight.

 

“No,” Yusuke replies warily, nails digging indents into one palm. He could never ask for more. His master is not heartless, or so he believes. And Yusuke is old enough that he can hunt, can coax out memories and dreams—but it is cruel thing. He does not wish to be cruel.

 

Yusuke smells the coming storm and he _hates_ the rain, hates the bone-shaking thunder and hates how cold it makes him feel and how it reminds him of less pleasant things—yet he cannot find the will to turn tail and flee. There is gold in the boy’s eyes, more brilliant than his master’s pelt on sunny days, like the glint of new coin and bright koi in warmer waters. Such a pretty hue of blue at his fingers, like an otherworldly sky, like stranger seas.

 

He does not run. He does not think he could, even if he wanted to.

 

“He killed your mother,” Akira continues, dark eyes fixed on Yusuke’s face. “Will you believe me?”

 

“I never knew my mother,” Yusuke says, but he does not stop Akira. He doesn’t think anything could stop him, anyways.

 

And Yusuke knows Akira tells the truth. He has snuck glances into Akira’s dreams as he’d dozed. Black wings wider than the skies, the rattling whispers of the dead and their regrets. A hellscape contained within Akira’s stormy gaze and bitter spells. There are hideous, insatiable tengu circling a castle of gold, and he is no fool. He knows these are the visions Akira sees, the ones that compel him to fell spirit after foul spirit.

 

He wishes to make Akira’s dreams less painful. He offers to take the nightmares, once, but Akira denies him.

 

So he finds the boy once again: standing before a mighty cage trapping a mightier god, hands dripping with ink and blood.

 

The priest merely looks at him, aglow with cruel blue fire and red magic. When the colors die down and the white paper in his hands shudders to a still, he drops the spent shikigami and beckons Yusuke closer. Despite wanting to run away, he finds himself doing the opposite, looking down at his master’s bloody grin. Within the cage of binding and harsh glowing scripts, he looks less gold and more of a garish yellow, like the peeling paints of old temples and awful memories.

 

Yusuke stares at Akira’s worn straw sandals and dirty robes, then once more at his master. Not dead, no, but he would starve to death in such a powerful cage before he could enter the heavens. Perhaps he expects Yusuke to sacrifice himself, but he cannot say so with his tongue burned black by magic. Oh, and those thin eyes glaring viciously at him now—they are terrifying.

 

Akira presses something thin into Yusuke’s hand. Soft palms, bony fingers. A charm, still glistening wetly with dark ink.

 

It is almost cathartic to see such gaudy gold darken into soot, quickly blown away by cold winds.

 

While Yusuke contemplates the burns on his hands, Akira writes life into paper again, fluttering bits of magic that flit about like butterflies until he bids them walk. Slowly, around where the golden kitsune had taken his last breath. A prayer, an apology, perhaps. Yusuke stares at the humble circle march of quiet spirits, then at the thin umbrage the priest casts as he walks away. He does not remember much of his mother. She is but a distant, forlorn memory, but still—his first home.

 

Where is he to go now?

 

Akira does not ask Yusuke to follow him, but he does so anyways. The boy heads west as if to chase the sun. Behind them, the storm pursues their shadows.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“Don’t you already have me memorized,” Akira asks teasingly, voice thick with sleep. He’d been dozing in the noon sun, overcome with the day’s warmth and slow rhythm. Now, he peeks at Yusuke through his messy hair, drowsy and soft in dappled sunlight. “Surely you don’t need to stare at me so intently when you paint.”

 

“It isn’t the same,” Yusuke tuts, and puts his palm over Akira’s face to force his eyes shut again. “Do indulge me a while longer.”

 

“Of course,” Akira says.

 

His eyes are closed and his face is peaceful, but there’s a mischievous curl to his lips as he lets his hands wander. First to Yusuke’s legs, then to the fur of his tails. Yusuke has long since given up on avoiding Akira’s insistent, curious touch; welcomes it now, even. Sometimes the priest’s bandaged fingers will flicker with magic and send delightful _thrill_ up his spine. He’d feared it at first, knows full well that even the gentlest touch can turn unkind. Akira has never turned a ruthless hand on him, but perhaps he would not mind it—if it were Akira.

 

“You’re thinking something weird again,” Akira says, eyes half-open although he’s been told to keep them closed, lifting a hand to rub at Yusuke’s ear. He leans into the touch despite his no-distraction policy while he paints. There isn’t anything he could deny Akira, even if it’s not the same the other way around. There’s nothing he could hide, either.

 

“How can you tell?”

 

“You make a strange face whenever you do.” With a soft laugh, he ruffles Yusuke’s hair, rubbing at the other ear. Yusuke lets out a pleased noise. “It’s cute, and also rather telling.”

 

“Is that so,” Yusuke hums, focused less on his painting and more on the way sunlight curves over Akira’s throat. When the wind blows, the smell of storm is faint, barely there. Akira knows him well enough that he sits up to kiss Yusuke’s nose comfortingly. Another kiss, right over his pulse.

 

He ends up scrapping the painting, later. It hardly compares to the real thing, warm and very _real_ in his arms.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

 

“You’re as cruel as you are beautiful,” Akira tells him once as he surveys some of Yusuke’s paintings, idly toying with some of the old brushes set off to the side. He runs a finger down a dry ink block, inspects the faint mark, and looks elsewhere. Most of the paintings are quite normal, at least to the human eye, and others glow with bits of spirits, of souls and memories he has stolen. Sometimes, when he cannot find the proper colors he wishes to express, it is better to press dreams into the paintings.

 

There are times, though, when Yusuke forgets that Akira is, above all, human. Frail, short-lived, and so very dear to him.

 

“Coming from you?” Yusuke murmurs, still painting. “I fear you do not know yourself as well as I thought you did.”

 

Within the temple of gold, a room of dusk.

 

From past the golden gates where he has tried to follow.

 

He has seen it once, and only once. Akira makes sure to ward his mind as he sleeps, now, well aware that Yusuke would attempt to steal his nightmares otherwise. He is cruel, crueler than Yusuke ever could be, and still so kind. Akira shines so brightly he’s even captured a phoenix’s heart, lulled the stormy seas into calmer waves. It is a small wonder that Yusuke finds himself drawn as close as he has been. Kitsune are more familiar with moonlight, but he prefers the warmth of Akira’s hands, the sly glint of his grin when he catches Yusuke staring at him.

 

Yusuke knows, of course, that the more Akira travels, the more spirits are bound to follow him, whether out of enchantment or for the sake of vengeance. It doesn’t stop him from being any less jealous, from leaving marks on Akira’s neck when he’s permitted to. He’s sure that he could force Akira into a possession, but he could never hurt Akira willingly. Everything Akira gives him, he will take—greedily.

 

He watches Akira often, and quite shamelessly at that. On the nights the priest visits to retrieve poor lost children, the days he naps in Yusuke’s company, only half-vulnerable, and even in Yusuke’s wanting, wanting dreams. His breath catches whenever he sees Akira’s expression turn cold and dark when purifying spirits, stormier than anything Yusuke has ever known.

 

“Repent,” Akira commands, and the demon before him trembles.

 

 _Ah_ , Yusuke sighs, and thinks, not for the first time: _I would do anything for him_.

 

 

* * *

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> [faint sound of thunder,  
> cloudy skies,  
> perhaps rain will come,  
> will you stay with me?]  
> [faint sound of thunder,  
> rain or not,  
> i will stay here,  
> together, with you]
> 
>  


End file.
